“Come on!” Starbride screamed, pitting all she had against the pyramid, forgetting her safety, forgetting everything but getting Maia back.
She set her passion against Fiendish cold, to smother it, melt it, whatever she had to do. As she cried out, she felt it give.
A splintering sound filled the room. “Time to go,” Scarra said.
“Almost.”
“Now!”
The splintering sound came again. The monks within the chapterhouse were breaking down the door. Scarra wrapped her arms around Starbride’s middle, but Starbride kept her focus, pushing, pushing…
“There!” she cried as the pyramid yielded to her at last. She came back to herself and clung on to the now-unconscious Maia, forcing Scarra to lift them both. “We have to take her.”
“Fine!” Scarra said. She let Starbride go and hefted Maia over her shoulder like a sack of flour. “Now will you go?”
Ruin and Drive tried to hold the remains of the door while monks reached for them from the other side. “Move!” Starbride cried, lifting a pyramid.
They dove to the sides as the fire pyramid smashed into the door, sending those on the other side scrabbling back. Pennynail had Hugo over his shoulders, and together, they staggered for the doors leading outside.
“What if they’re barred?” Fury yelled.
Starbride launched a disintegration pyramid at the door, one of the few she possessed. She couldn’t afford to care if anyone outside was caught in its wake. A deep, hollow sound filled the antechamber as a black sphere blossomed. Everyone gasped. Starbride imagined her teeth were vibrating. When the sphere faded, it left a perfect half-circle cut in the wooden door and a bowl-shaped divot in the floor.
Outside, three monks backed away with terror-filled faces. Mind controlled as they might be, no one wanted to stand up to that. Roland should have sent corpse Fiends. Maybe with all the patrols, they had too much to do.
Ruin and Drive knocked the waiting monks down. When they looked back at the chapterhouse, their eyes widened. “Keep running,” Ruin said.
Starbride didn’t question him; she just made sure no one got left behind. It was very early evening, and they couldn’t be seen carrying two unconscious people through the streets. Drive led them into an alley, and they jogged into the back ways of Marienne.
Chapter Twenty-one
Katya
Katya awoke the next day ready to hunt Darren down. The only question was how many allies she could take with her. Many of their fighters were occupied training new recruits. Katya had a thought about trying to entice Lord Vincent away, but she knew he’d rather die than shirk his duty to protect the youngest heirs.
She wasn’t surprised when Count Mathias joined her; he brought men, dogs, and an enormous boar spear that might give even Darren pause. He added considerable strength to Katya, Brutal, Castelle, her friends, and several Allusian trackers. Still, Katya breathed a sigh of relief when Redtrue and two other adsnazi joined them as well.
“What did you come up with to fight the Fiends, Redtrue?” Katya asked.
“I won’t give in to the destructive ways of your people.”
“Yes, pyradistés are bad. We’ve covered that.”
Redtrue grinned wryly and drew a pyramid from the bag at her side. It had no filigree, only a few large facets. When she held it up, it cast little rainbows along her lap. “It will either repel the creatures or attract them.”
“You don’t know which?”
“You know these Fiends better than I.”
“I’m no pyradisté. Spirits know I’m no adsnazi either.”
“Maybe you should have brought your pyradisté.”
Katya shook her head. “He doesn’t know anything about Fiends.”
“I thought you had fought them before.”
“Us,” Katya said, gesturing to Brutal, Castelle and herself. “No one else has much experience with them. Despite what you may think, Marienne wasn’t always awash in evil monsters.”
Redtrue shrugged as if she didn’t quite believe that. Her adsnazi friends were armed with the same pyramids as her, none of them knowing what they would do. Katya had to laugh at the absurdity. At least it would be an adventure.
As they left, Hawkblade and a few of her nomads joined them. She simply nodded to Katya as the nomads guided their horses alongside everyone else. Katya glanced at Redtrue. “I don’t suppose you’re willing to offer your services as translator as well as adsnazi?”
“A Farradain phrase feels apt here: How much is it worth to you?”
“I’ll leave Castelle in charge of payment.”
Redtrue only snorted.
They circled the village Darren had visited, and the scouts spread out. Count Mathias’s dogs quickly picked up the trail. By the tracks, Darren hadn’t come to the village alone, though he remained on foot. Katya guessed the corpse Fiends couldn’t ride. No horse would stand them, and he wouldn’t want to leave them behind, coward that he was, not if he might be fighting anyone stronger than farmhands. By midmorning, they were fast on his track.
“How can he stay ahead of us?” Count Mathias asked.
“The corpse Fiends are faster than humans, and they don’t tire. I don’t know what Darren’s limits are.”
He leaned forward as if willing his horse to go faster. Katya admired his enthusiasm even as she found it a bit unsettling.
One of the nomad scouts rushed toward them over a rise. “What have you found?” Katya called.
He yelled something in Allusian. “He spotted someone,” Redtrue said, “but they disappeared into a copse. He says they ran faster than anyone he’s seen before.”
They broke into a gallop, keeping their outriders just ahead. The dogs began to bay and headed for a break in the forest. As the horses broke through, Katya spied a sleepy little hamlet in a small valley below.
“Oh, spirits,” she whispered. Screams floated on the wind. Katya kicked her horse into a run, but it shied, already tired. It barely reached a canter, huffing and puffing.
At the outskirts of the village, they dismounted. Smoke billowed between the houses, and the horses backed away from it.
Katya let hers go. “Stay together.” She drew her rapier as she moved. People dressed in homespun dashed past her. When some of them saw her party, they bolted in another direction.
Count Mathias called, “Where are the monsters?”
One or two villagers pointed up the lane, but Katya followed the smoke. In the center of the village was a chapterhouse decorated with carvings of all ten spirits. Flames danced along its roof. Darren popped out of the doorway, his Fiendish features plain upon his face. Injured people writhed on the dirt in front of him. When he saw Katya, he grabbed a weeping man and held him as a shield. The scouts kept their bows up but didn’t try for a shot.
Darren laughed, grabbed another villager, and tossed her into the burning building.
“Bastard!” Katya yelled.
He laughed, and the grating sound made Katya’s ears ache. “Tell you what. I’ll take my leave now, and you can rescue all the poor unfortunate souls trapped behind me.”
“You die here,” Katya said.
“Come and get me. I’ll be slaughtering peasants until you do.” He jumped inside the building with his hostage, and Katya heard more screams.
She looked to her fellows. They could wait for the building to burn down around Darren’s ears, but there was no guarantee that would kill him. It would kill everyone else, though, if Darren didn’t do that first.
“Cover the exits,” she told the scouts. “If he comes out first, shoot him and call for help.”
The rest of them ran into the chapterhouse. Just inside, a corpse Fiend flew at them from the left. Count Mathias blocked its short blade with his boar spear. He pushed it away and braced his legs for another thrust. Katya was ready to leave him with his men, wanting to find Darren, but Redtrue lifted her pyramid. Pure white radiance flowed out, and the room seemed to gray around the edges.
When the light touched the pyramid in the corpse Fiend’s forehead, it exploded with a bang, taking the Fiend’s head with it.
Brutal whooped. Count Mathias’s face fell as if disappointed. Katya felt like cheering.
Redtrue shook her head. “I…I didn’t know…”
“Better than we hoped!” Katya said.
She turned an appalled look Katya’s way. “I can’t use this.” She looked to her fellows, who nodded, faces pale. “It’s…destructive!”
“What in all the spirits’ names…” Katya turned her back; she didn’t have time to argue about how people’s lives were at stake. She moved deeper into the chapterhouse, through another set of doors into a large room filled with benches. Crude portraits of the ten spirits ringed the walls. Another corpse Fiend leapt up from its hiding place. Katya blocked its attack with her rapier, but it jumped to the side and skewered one of Count Mathias’s men, too quickly for a human.
Katya aimed for its head, but it ducked under one of the benches and scuttled away like a spider. Hawkblade leapt a bench and stabbed at it. Katya glanced upward at the smoke, not knowing how much longer the roof would hold. Some of the nomads and adsnazi were dragging injured people toward the door. They needed to find Darren.
“Come on, Brutal.” Katya raced for the doorway leading deeper into the building. He stayed by her side, Castelle and three friends with them. Count Mathias stayed with Hawkblade, facing off against the corpse Fiend. Redtrue started to come with Katya.
“Get out,” Katya snarled over her shoulder. “Tend the wounded.”
Redtrue turned away without a word. Up ahead, down a narrow hallway, a man yelled, “No!”
Katya hustled forward, but the hallway was filling with smoke. “Why is it always fire with that bastard?”
“Have to hurry,” Brutal said.
Around a corner, Darren still held his captive. He lobbed a pyramid into a nearby doorway, and flames burst from it. Katya put up an arm to shield her face, and when she lowered it, Darren had moved on. They started to hurry forward when Katya heard coughing. The room was full of villagers, their only door now blocked by fire. A window behind them offered escape for some, but the larger ones wouldn’t make it. Still, they clawed at it like wounded animals.
Brutal leapt the flames and hurled villagers out of the way until he could reach the window. He slammed at the wall with his huge mace, widening the hole.
Katya hurried after Darren. She couldn’t shake the feeling that if they lost him here, they wouldn’t catch him again. A hall of closed doors ending in a dead end waited around the corner. The building was built as an un-joined square, leaving Darren no place to go.
He had a supply of pyramids from Roland. They had to be ready for everything. “Take a door, open it, then duck.” Castelle and her friends obeyed, but all the rooms stood empty.
“He had to have gone out a window,” Castelle said.
“Come on.” The windows led to a garden at the heart of the structure. The villagers from the fire room were crawling out from the wall facing Katya and stumbling toward an iron gate that led into the village beyond. Another pyramid sailed their way from a clump of bushes.
“Look out!” Katya called. The pyramid burst across the gate, catching the wood of the building on fire as well as one man stuck in the gap. The others staggered back, faces red and blistered. Smoke from the roof floated down around them.
Katya squeezed through the window just as Brutal did the same through his widened portal across from her. They rushed the bushes, and Darren sprang out. His villager shield was gone, but their archers were on the other side of the fire.
“I knew you’d get my message,” Darren said to Katya. “Thanks for giving me all night to plan my little party. Very smart.”
“You needed all night to trap yourself with us?” Katya asked. “Who’s the smart one?”
He dashed for the clump of villagers and slashed one with his claws. She fell, screaming and trying to keep her intestines where they belonged. Katya moved, but Darren was so damned fast. Two of Castelle’s friends rushed him, but he cut down another villager before they could reach him.
“Can’t you even save one?” Darren called. Brutal moved to cover the villagers, swinging his mace to drive Darren away. Darren leapt backward; he’d learned to stay out of reach since their last fight. Katya wished she had Maia or Pennynail, anyone with good aim and a throwing weapon.
Breaking glass caught her attention, and a massive spear flew at Darren, nicking his side. He grabbed it and threw it, impaling another villager. Katya heard the sound of hacking wood. Count Mathias was trying to come to their aid, but Darren was slippery as an eel, quite content to kill villagers and let the roof burn. He had a sword on his hip, but he hadn’t bothered to draw it.
Katya’s throat burned from the smoke. The fire blocking the exit had grown as if Darren had treated the ground. As she watched it, the earth seemed to roll like a wave at sea. It smothered the fire in one gulp.
Redtrue strode through the gap, holding another pyramid. She faced the fire still burning the chapterhouse’s sides, and the earth lapped at what it could reach, putting it out. “This way!” she called.
Hawkblade and her nomads climbed into the garden and shepherded villagers toward the exit. Katya darted for Darren. She pressed him over and over, forcing him toward Castelle who stabbed at his back. He leapt to the side, into Brutal, who bashed him so hard it sent him flying.
Count Mathias stumbled through the remains of the wall, pulled his spear from the dead villager, and threw it, pinning Darren’s arm to the building.
He screeched, and Katya fought the urge to cover her ears. Instead, she ran for him. One of Castelle’s friends threw a knife into Darren’s leg now that he’d stilled, but that didn’t stop him from trying to work the spear out of his arm. He pulled it out in a jet of blood and hurled it at Katya. She ducked out of the way, willing the others to keep attacking. Behind her, she heard a gurgling scream.
Darren sagged, and Castelle stabbed him. He leapt to his feet, less hurt than they thought, and rammed his claws into her belly.
“Cass!” Katya yelled. Darren let her go and ran from Katya’s blade.
Castelle sank to her knees, hands over her wound.
Darren leapt around Brutal and streaked for the exit. “Redtrue!” Katya called. “Use the damned pyramid!”
Count Mathias sprang for Darren, swinging his bearskin cloak. It tangled in Darren’s legs and tripped him. Redtrue backed away, her eyes horrified.
“Redtrue!” Katya called again. Redtrue looked to her and then to where Castelle knelt on the ground. Darren had regained his feet. “Use the pyramid!”
Redtrue looked at the one she was holding. Katya raced toward her, about to call, “Not that one!” but before she got a chance, Redtrue focused on Darren, and the earth did that little hiccup again. He pinwheeled in midair a moment, came down on his stomach, and then fought to get to his feet. With a leap, Brutal brought his mace crunching down on Darren’s back. Dirt flew up around him, and the snapping sound echoed through the garden like a breaking branch.
Darren howled. Katya slid to a stop and stabbed Darren in the neck, over and over, seeking a pyramid like the one they’d found in Lady Hilda. Even after Count Mathias joined her in stabbing, long after Darren stopped moving, Katya hacked away.
“He’s dead,” someone behind her said, and the quiet voice broke her concentration. Redtrue stared at her as if she were a monster. Darren lay in a bloody heap at her feet, back flattened and neck and head a ruined mess.
“No trophy, then,” Count Mathias said. He leaned on his gore-covered spear. “Shame, but I supposed he looked human when he actually died.”
Katya’s bile rose at the thought of a human trophy. She turned away and hurried toward where Brutal tended Castelle.
“We can manage these,” Brutal said. “He didn’t hurt you too badly.”
Castelle shook like a leaf, her face stark white. “Could have f
ooled me.”
Count Mathias knelt by her side and offered her a flask. She drank it, spit part of it up in a cough, and took another long pull. Count Mathias offered it to Katya. “Brandy?”
She shook her head, but Brutal said, “I could use it.” He lifted Castelle’s bandages and poured some over her wounds.
She stuttered out a cry. “Trying to get me drunk from the inside, Brutal?” she asked through her teeth.
“It’ll keep infection away. If you’re well enough to joke, you’re well enough for me to carry you out of here.
“How romantic,” she said. “How’s Harry?”
Katya looked to Castelle’s dead friend. “Not good.”
“Dead,” Count Mathias said, “just as my man Hull is, as more would have been if not for…her.”
He said “her” quietly, as if talking about a spirit. Katya followed his admiring gaze to Hawkblade and her nomads.
“We’ll drink a toast to the fallen later,” Brutal said.
Katya searched what remained of Darren but found nothing. If he’d been receiving orders from Roland, he’d left them elsewhere or destroyed them. She left the chapterhouse with everyone else.
“Can you do anything about the rest of the fire?” she asked Redtrue.
“Only near the ground.”
At least she was good for something. She shook the thought away as she left the garden. Redtrue was a possible link to Starbride, and Katya couldn’t risk breaking that link. But Redtrue had a way to kill Fiends instantly and didn’t use it. How many people would be alive if she had? Count Mathias’s man and Castelle’s friend, countless villagers.
Katya headed around the building, lost in thought. Something hit her broadside, biting into her shoulder, and knocking her feet out from under her. She tried to scramble up, but pain rolled up her arm. From the corner of her eye, she saw a corpse Fiend’s knife coming for her face. She snarled and kicked, catching the Fiend in the stomach. It gave her a little distance, enough to bring her rapier around.
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